You know one of those posters where they feature celebrities from different eras that may or may not have ever been together in the same room? Like James Dean, Mickey Mouse and Lenny Bruce standing at a bar, smoking cigarettes. Okay, I’m pretty sure those three never hung out. In 75 years, when we’re all dead and buried, except for maybe some of my preteen readers — YASSSSSS I never forget you! — they will decide to make a poster featuring some standouts from this year: Trump, Hillary, Nadiya from The Great British Bake Off. Also, on that poster will be one player from the 2016 World Champion Cubs team, the last Cubs team to win the World Series in 75 years. Which player will be on that poster made from the last remaining tree? I don’t think it’ll be David Ross, prolly not Arrieta, not for this year, maybe Bryant, maybe Rizzo, maybe Hendricks and maybe Jon Lester. Yesterday, pushed forward Lester’s agenda to get on the “last tree poster” — 8 IP, 0 ER, 4 baserunners, 8 Ks, lowering his ERA to 2.40, moving his record to 17-4, and, since the All-Star break, it’s a 1.47 ERA in 73 1/3 IP. His ERAs over the last four years: 3.75, 2.46, 3.34 and 2.40. And you thought Saberhagenmetrics were some contrived statistical model. Look in the mirror, and pfft yourself. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:
Anthony Rizzo – 2-for-5, 3 RBIs and his 30th and 31st homers. HR(s) to the Rizzo!
Michael Wacha – 1 IP, 3 ER as he was activated from the DL and moved to the bullpen. The Cards will now try to remove innings from Wacha’s arm that they put on it last year. Cardinals aren’t the only team guilty of this. Instead of shutting down pitchers when they should be, they pay the price the following year(s). It’s like teams are terrible at utilizing the withdrawal method.
Kevin Kiermaier – 2-for-4, 2 runs, 2 RBIs with his 12th homer, hitting over .400 in the last week with five homers and five steals in the last eleven games. No idea where I’ve heard his name before, it might — again with some stank — MIGHT be from my constant mentioning of him.
Alex Cobb – 6 2/3 IP, 1 ER, 5 baserunners, 4 Ks, ERA at 3.06. Nope, still don’t trust him, but he’s going a long way to helping me trust him for next year. I.e., Cobb falls backwards, I hold up my finger, saying, “Can we resume this in a few months?” then I catch him in March. Luckily, Cobb was able to do a Jabbawockeez mid-air freeze.
Corey Dickerson – 3-for-5, 4 RBIs and his 20th homer. Hitting near-.550 in the last week with two homers. If I had synesthesia, the ability to see sounds, I would hear “hot schmotato” and see a doodie emoji with flame emojis wearing a jersey that reads Dickerson.
Josh Donaldson – Missed his third straight game and underwent an MRI on his hip. Damn, this feels like one of those news reports that is brushed off this year — “Donaldson will be fine with some rest.” — then next year, he’s drafted in the top ten and when he’s doing miserably in May people are wondering why.
Marco Estrada – 5 1/3 IP, 4 ER, 7 baserunners, 7 Ks, ERA up to 3.78. My tulpa has been telling you people to avoid Estrada, maybe now you’ll believe in conjured spirits.
Starling Marte – Could return on Friday. Even Vince Staples could smile at that.
Clayton Kershaw – 5 IP, 0 ER, 1 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 1.81. I don’t know if he ever tires, but I feel legit bad for the teams in October that are going to face a well-rested Kershaw.
Billy Butler – Signed a deal with the Yankees. Butler going to the Yanks is the like the pachyderm circle of life, completing what started when the Yanks traded to the Royals Balboni.
Nick Markakis – 1-for-3, 2 RBIs and his 12th homer. He now has three homers in the past five games. I’ve owned him for two of those five games. The two days he didn’t homer. Smooth move, Ex-Lax!
Julio Teheran – 5 1/3 IP, 5 ER, ERA up to 3.18. Bad day for Teheran. Actually, Teheran hasn’t had a good day since 1953.
Jose Fernandez – 7 IP, 4 ER, 8 baserunners, 3 Ks, ERA at 2.99. Good thing he wasn’t shut down three starts ago. Important the Marlins pretend to care about the playoffs while barely being a .500 team. Is the sarcasm font coming through on your browser?
Marcell Ozuna – 2-for-4, 4 RBIs and his 23rd homer. OZUNA like hitting in Turner Field. OZUNA enjoy it more than Turner Classic Movies and Turner & Hooch.
Freddy Galvis – 2-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 19th homer, and his third homer in the past four games. Damn, someone’s vying to be Friday’s Buy lede. Don’t worry, I won’t subject you to that, but you should pick up Galvis.
Jeanmar Gomez – 2/3 IP, 0 ER and his 37th save. Phils’ manager Pete Macktheknife gave Gomez a vote confidence even though he’s been struggling recently, saying, “I thought about (replacing him) and I don’t know if that’s such a good idea only because I don’t want to send a message to him that he’s had some rough outings.” I’m going to put aside what he said is actually the wrong message already, and applaud him for doing the right thing. He should’ve told the reporter, “Why the effin’ eff would I replace the closer? To sh*t on a guy that did well for us all year so we can close out win number sixty-three in an otherwise disastrous season?”
Tommy Joseph – 2-for-4, 3 runs and his 19th homer. It’s criminal how little ToJo plays, and appropriately enough there’s too much a-resting!
Jose Altuve – Out with oblique discomfort. This could prove to be the end of Altuve’s season. You can see from his MRI how precarious this is.
George Springer – 2-for-5 and his 27th homer. He hasn’t quite broken out like I imagined this year, but he’s far from a bust as the Player Rater shows. Top 50’s not too shabby.
Alex Bregman – Left yesterday’s game with hamstring discomfort. He started reaching for it as he was heading into third, which is totally perverted! Any hoo! This could be the end of Bregman too.
Nomar Mazara – 2-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 18th homer. He’s been so bad… Audience response, “How bad has he been?!” Where the hell does this audience come from?! Mazara has been so bad he has two or more hits in only three games since July 30th.
Jean Segura – 5-for-6, 3 runs, 3 RBIs and his 15th and 16th homers, and 3rd and 4th homers in two days. Mean Jean rocking-the-land!
Brandon Drury – 3-for-5, 2 runs, 2 RBIs and his 14th homer, and his 3rd homer in as many games. Yes, screaming Drury makes you sound like Sloth from The Goonies, but damn is he hot! Drury want Baby Ruth?
Charlie Blackmon – 3-for-5, 2 runs and his 27th homer, and 2nd homer in as many days. *spritz, spritz* That’s nothing. *blows on wrists to dry cologne* I’m Chazz Noir.
Daniel Descalso – 1-for-3, 2 RBIs and his 7th homer. I saw he homered on Monday and I was like, “Whatevs, it’s Daniel Descalso.” Now, I see he homered in his 2nd game in a row and I’m like, “Stop considering Daniel Descalso, you’re embarrassing yourself!”
Hisashi Iwakuma – 6 1/3 IP, 1 ER, 8 baserunners, 2 Ks, ERA at 3.87. If you can avoid Pujols and Trout, you get a little Graterol, Petit and Ortega. You follow baseball all season, you’re even here in September, and you have no idea if I made up the names Graterol, Petit and Ortega. That’s what you get vs. the Angels.
Kyle Seager – 1-for-4 and his 29th homer, hitting .287. He’s blown through his career high in homers, and is on pace for a career high in average. Yet, I just want to talk about his younger brother.
Kevin Gausman – 8 IP, 0 ER, 5 baserunners, 6 Ks, ERA at 3.43. In his past 33 IP, he’s only allowed 3 ER. A lot of pitching right now is based on matchups vs. how good the pitcher is, but Gausman should just be owned.
Rick Porcello – 8 IP, 1 ER, 4 baserunners, 6 Ks, ERA at 3.12, moving his record to 20-4. The AL’s pitching is such a giant bowl of meh that I’m seriously not sure if there’s anyone else that could get the Cy Young in the AL. Do you give it to Chris Sale for S’s and G’s and Ks?
Junior Guerra – 6 IP, 0 ER, 5 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 2.81. Next year, Guerra’s gonna been in that same “I don’t know what to do” with his teammate, Hernan Perez, but I’m leaning towards not wanting any part of either of them. Guerra is the more confusing of the two, and I’ll definitely need to look closer at him this offseason, but he’s 31 years old, and 31-year-old rookies don’t usually have long shelf lives.
Domingo Santana – 2-for-4, 3 RBIs and his 8th homer. Don’t really have time for baby steps, Bob, but Domingo started vs. a righty and hit a home run off another righty. Granted, it was The ‘Dorf.
Scooter Gennett – 1-for-3, 2 runs, 2 RBIs and his 12th homer, hitting near-.300 in the last week with two homers. Could be a rising schmotato. By the way, Scooter is such an awful nickname, I’m going to call him ScooGe. ScooGe is so much better. I got you, ScooGe!
Carlos Rodon – 5 IP, 6 ER, ERA at 4.04. Way to finish strong. You schmohawk.
Josh Tomlin – 5 IP, 1 ER, 4 baserunners, 2 Ks, ERA at 4.75. Tomlin’s had a terrible half, kinda like All of Me, before the feel-good conclusion. Stream-o-Nator likes Tomlin’s next matchup, and yesterday may be a sign he can be trusted again.
Coco Crisp – 2-for-4, 3 RBIs and his 12th homer. He usually hits them in bunches, but he’s been hideous since his trade to the Indians, so if you grab him, it’s a bit of a lark, which would make you a Coco bird.
Tyler Skaggs – His forearm MRI came out clean. The mother from My Big Fat Greek Wedding sprayed it with Windex.
Brian Dozier – 2-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 41st homer, but moments after that Mark Trumbo hit his 42nd to stay in front of him. This is better than Sosa/McGwire! Due to the lack of the unsightly bacne.
Kurt Suzuki – 1-for-4, 3 RBIs and his 8th homer, and 2nd homer in the past three games. Suzuki’s no Sidekick, because he’s got a hard top, Amigo!
Ian Kinsler – 4-for-5, 2 runs, 3 RBIs, hitting .282. If Ian Kinsler were a character in The Man in the High Castle, he’d be Frank Frink.
Luis Sardinas – 3-for-5, 2 runs, 1 RBI and his 3rd steal. Damn, Sardinas packed stats into his line like…um…can’t think of something that is packed tightly for Sardinas. Can I get a hint?
Hunter Strickland – Bochy said that Strickland was unlucky on Tuesday when he coughed up runs like a butthole having an allergic reaction and would still be called on to close games. Derek Law could also be a possibility for saves. In other words, if this were April, Sergio Romo would be the closer by May, but we don’t have that kind of time to sift through options, so this is a total shizzshow, bullpen shituation, and only Strickland’s worth owning.
Wilson Ramos – 1-for-3 and his 21st homer, hitting .304. After he hit the home run ball, he screamed, “There’s only one L in Wilson!” I think that was a Contreras call-out.
Tanner Roark – 7 IP, 0 ER, 7 baserunners, 7 Ks, ERA at 2.75. For the mostly meaningless stat of day, Roark has more scoreless 7+ IP starts than any other starter in the majors (9; next closest Arrieta with 7). For a completely unrelated stat, the social media director of the Mayo Clinic saw Tanner and Melancon being discussed and was almost 30% sure it pertained to melanoma.
Wilmer Flores – Headed to see a doctor about his sore wrist. He’s also looking forward to getting a lollipop.
Robert Gsellman – 5 2/3 IP, 0 ER, 6 baserunners, 4 Ks, ERA at 3.08. Doesn’t Gsellman look like one of those high school languages you use so adults can’t understand you? Like Pig Latin or Oppish. No? Okay, guess it’s just me. For Gsellman, I’d use the Stream-o-Nator, which likes his next start.
Jacob deGrom – Threw again on Wednesday, along with Steven Matz. These two should get a room! Maybe at the Hotel California because that song is really about dead arms (I think).
Yordano Ventura – 4 1/3 IP, 5 ER. Doode, I’m sorry, that’s pathetic. It’s the A’s and you’re home. Ventura, go pick a fight with yourself in the mirror and get beat up.
Sean Manaea – 5 IP, 0 ER, 4 baserunners, 5 Ks, but pulled after 67 pitches because he’s nursing a back injury. I also don’t trust him in away games. Watch out, boy! He’ll chew you up! Ooh…He’s a Manaea.
Ryon Healy – 2-for-4, 1 run, 1 RBI, hitting near-.400 in the last week with three homers. You know the dealio. On a related note, the A’s lineup has Maxwell/Semien, which sounds like the goal for a sperm bank heist by a group of black girls.
